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Title:

A Review of the Accuracy of Wisconsin’s Traffic Forecasting Tools

Accession Number:

01515634

Record Type:

Component

Availability:

Transportation Research Board Business Office

500 Fifth Street, NW
Washington, DC 20001 United States

Abstract:

Traffic forecasting is the process of estimating the number of vehicles that will use a specific roadway facility in the future. The Traffic Forecasting Section at the Wisconsin Department of Transportation perform several hundred traffic forecasts per year, which are used as inputs in developing and evaluating Wisconsin’s transportation infrastructure. A study of the accuracy of the Department’s recent traffic forecasts was conducted in 2012, analyzing 131 forecasts completed from 2003 through 2011. This paper provides benchmark traffic forecast accuracy results, comparing them with other national and international reports on traffic forecast accuracy, and provides differentiated accuracy analysis, including the utilization of different forecasting tools and performance in various geographical areas. Results indicated that the use of travel demand models, where available, significantly improved traffic forecast accuracy and utilization of this forecasting tool proved to be the most accurate method in predicting future traffic volumes. Travel demand model utilization, in comparison to other forecasting methods employed by the Department during this time period, also minimized the number of forecasts that were outside of the predetermined Department thresholds for quality control purposes. Results from this study will allow for improvement and fine tuning of forecasting methodology at the Department, and will provide a reproducible method for further study of traffic forecast accuracy.

Supplemental Notes:

This paper was sponsored by TRB committee ADB40 Transportation Demand Forecasting. Alternate title: Review of Accuracy of Wisconsin’s Traffic Forecasting Tools.

Monograph Accession #:

01503729

Report/Paper Numbers:

14-1717

Language:

English

Corporate Authors:

Transportation Research Board

500 Fifth Street, NW
Washington, DC 20001 United States

Authors:

Buck, Karl
Sillence, Mike

Pagination:

14p

Publication Date:

2014

Conference:

Transportation Research Board 93rd Annual Meeting

Location: Washington DC
Date: 2014-1-12 to 2014-1-16
Sponsors: Transportation Research Board

Media Type:

Digital/other

Features:

Maps; References; Tables

Subject Areas:

Highways; Operations and Traffic Management; Planning and Forecasting; I72: Traffic and Transport Planning; I73: Traffic Control

Source Data:

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2014 Paper #14-1717

Files:

TRIS, TRB, ATRI

Created Date:

Jan 27 2014 2:37PM